The United States Supreme Court on Friday (June 24) revoked the 1973 Roe vs. Wade ruling, which guaranteed abortion as a constitutional right in the country.
This cancellation now gives each State the possibility of legislating according to its own convictions on the voluntary termination of pregnancy.
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A return of 50 years back for women's rights, seeming to go against the grain of the march of the world.
Indeed, according to the Center for Reproductive Rights, nearly 50 countries have liberalized abortion in the past two decades.
France, for its part, reinforced the contours of the practice last February, adopting a bill extending its legal period from 12 to 14 weeks.
But globally, more than 41 percent of women of childbearing age live in countries with restrictive laws, according to the Center for Reproductive Rights.
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Countries where abortion is completely prohibited
In America
In Central America, Honduras, El Salvador and Nicaragua, abortion is completely illegal.
In Nicaragua, the act is banned in all circumstances.
If before 2006, the legislation still allowed pregnant women to have an abortion in the event of rape or endangering their health, a new measure that came into force in 2008 ended up repealing these exceptions.
In the Caribbean, women living in the Dominican Republic (Caribbean) and Suriname (South America) face this ban.
In Europe
In Europe, the total ban on abortion is an exception, except in Malta, in particular, where abortion is completely criminalized.
The women who have recourse to it and the doctors practicing it incur sentences that can range from three to four years in prison.
On June 27, 2022, 135 Maltese doctors filed a legal appeal against this ban.
The Vatican and Andorra also ban the medical procedure.
In Africa and Asia
Egypt, Senegal, Gabon, Madagascar and Mauritania totally outlaw the law.
The Mauritanian assembly has twice refused to review its measures concerning abortion.
Any woman having access to it is thus liable to a prison sentence ranging from one to five years, according to information from the United Nations.
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Countries where access to abortion is restricted
In other countries around the world, abortion is permitted but remains subject to extreme restrictions.
Poland, for example, authorizes abortion in these cases only: rape or incest and endangering the life of the mother.
This last condition also acts as the only valid reason for terminating a pregnancy, in many countries of the Middle East, including Libya, Iraq, Lebanon and Syria.
The same in Afghanistan, Yemen, Bangladesh, Burma, Sri Lanka, Guatemala, Paraguay and Venezuela.
In Brazil, access to abortion is still very limited.
Voluntary termination of a pregnancy is only authorized in the event of rape, risk to the mother or serious malformation of the fetus.
Recently, a case caused a stir in the country.
President Jair Bolsonaro has indeed described as "unacceptable" the fact that an 11-year-old girl terminated her pregnancy legally after being the victim of a rape.
The teenager had also had to face a trying legal fight before being able to have an abortion.
In Italy, abortion has been legal since 1978, but in some regions, abortion is impossible.
According to a report by the Italian Ministry of Health published in 2021, nearly 67% of gynecologists still refused in 2019 to perform the interruption.
In question ?
The conscience clause for doctors, which authorizes them - as in France - to oppose a patient's decision and not to perform the act, for personal, professional or ethical reasons.
Countries on the rise
Recently, major advances are to be highlighted on a global scale.
Thus, since February 21, 2022, Colombia has authorized its citizens to practice voluntary termination of pregnancy until the sixth month of gestation.
A historic decision in this predominantly Catholic and conservative Latin American country.
On April 28, 2021, Ecuador decriminalized abortion for rape cases.
Before that date, the country only allowed it if the pregnancy endangered the life of the mother, or on proof of a malformation of the fetus.
Same development on the side of Thailand in February 2021, which now allows women to abort up to 12 weeks of amenorrhea.
According to figures from the World Health Organization (WHO) dated November 25, 2021, around 73 million voluntary terminations of pregnancy take place each year around the world.
The institution estimates that 25 million of them are practiced in dangerous conditions for women.
